Saeviomagy
Adventurer
... that sounds like you're agreeing that playing an unarmored character is basically a way to guarantee that your participation in the game is going to be sharply limited.
So what's the most powerful combo in Rifts?
... that sounds like you're agreeing that playing an unarmored character is basically a way to guarantee that your participation in the game is going to be sharply limited.
Yeah, unless they hit first.
Or, to mangle a Monty Python quote, they succeed at not being seen (or hit).
IME, every RIFTS party that has included non-MDC capable PCs has either gotten those PCs MDC armor pretty quickly or found them a FHW (Freakin' Huge Weapon).
Until one or the other was achieved, non-MDC PCs laid low and contributed in other ways. If they got armor first, they continued to sit out combats until they got a MDC weapon. If they got a FHW first, they contributed to combats and either used guerilla tactics or something that the best Korean MIGs used to do when encountering top American pilots*- shoot once then run. Those FHW-equipped PCs occasionally made a direct difference in the fight by actually damaging or destroying a foe, but even if they didn't, it definitely made them reconsider their tactics... How many of those guys who ran into the woods were carrying rail guns again?
* The "fire & flee" tactic was also used in the Middle East by the Arab nations attacking Israel in the 1960s and 70s- they couldn't afford to risk their best pilots and newest planes (both in short supply) in extended dogfights with Israeli pilots, but could definitely afford the price of a few missiles fired in the hope of taking down a foe before ducking back into friendly airspace.
Or, to mangle a Monty Python quote, they succeed at not being seen (or hit).
IME, every RIFTS party that has included non-MDC capable PCs has either gotten those PCs MDC armor pretty quickly or found them a FHW (Freakin' Huge Weapon).
Until one or the other was achieved, non-MDC PCs laid low and contributed in other ways. If they got armor first, they continued to sit out combats until they got a MDC weapon. If they got a FHW first, they contributed to combats and either used guerilla tactics or something that the best Korean MIGs used to do when encountering top American pilots*- shoot once then run. Those FHW-equipped PCs occasionally made a direct difference in the fight by actually damaging or destroying a foe, but even if they didn't, it definitely made them reconsider their tactics... How many of those guys who ran into the woods were carrying rail guns again?
* The "fire & flee" tactic was also used in the Middle East by the Arab nations attacking Israel in the 1960s and 70s- they couldn't afford to risk their best pilots and newest planes (both in short supply) in extended dogfights with Israeli pilots, but could definitely afford the price of a few missiles fired in the hope of taking down a foe before ducking back into friendly airspace.
1 MD was equal to 100SDC, so a typical MDC blaster will kill any normal human. The only folks who got changed into MD creatures when coming to RIFTS earth were mostly super heroes. Supernatural things tended to end up MD and many super hero powers converted the SDC directly into MDC.
The Old Ones weren't included as PC options thankfully (sadly?). The Splugorth are a race similar to the Old Ones really, evil alien intelligences. The Splugorth and the vampire intelligences are pretty similar as well. There are multiples in RIFTS Earth, they just carve out their own chunk of the planet
Most powerful characters in the game were actually the most complex.
My friend Colin was a freak about the game and one day he made an "ultimate character" game where each player could play their ulimate character made.
I remember that he made a dragon juice with over three million MDC, 15 attacks, automatic dodge, and each of his hits would do 15d6x10 damage.
Mine was a four armed mutant magic robot pilot, who controlled 8 robots each with 6 attacks, each of which did 1d6x10 damage.
Then there was the tattooed alien phase walking kung fu master with super strength who he managed to get his strength up to 126.
Most broken game system ever.
My friend Colin was a freak about the game and one day he made an "ultimate character" game where each player could play their ulimate character made.
I remember that he made a dragon juice with over three million MDC, 15 attacks, automatic dodge, and each of his hits would do 15d6x10 damage.
Mine was a four armed mutant magic robot pilot, who controlled 8 robots each with 6 attacks, each of which did 1d6x10 damage.
Then there was the tattooed alien phase walking kung fu master with super strength who he managed to get his strength up to 126.
Most broken game system ever.
Welcome to the boards!
And yes, RIFTS' system is quite the mess.
The setting, though...ahhhh...that's some gold right there!
And yes, RIFTS' system is quite the mess.
The setting, though...ahhhh...that's some gold right there!
ArekExcelsior
First Post
There's a few.
A) Superliminal Flight + Rocket Charge or Rocket Fists (the first two are from Powers Unlimited 3, the latter from PU 2). Get going at Superliminal. Unlike Cosmo-Knight flight, this is NOT a hyperspatial jump, but your character going CONTINUOUSLY at that speed for the whole arc. Rocket Charge and Rocket Fists make it so you ignore ramming damage. Page 72 of HU Revised 2nd Edition gives you +4 damage per mile per hour. So:
186,000 miles per second per level [since you get x1 FTL per level] * 60 seconds per minute * 60 minutes per hour * 4 damage = Your base striking damage + 2,678,400,000
Since they imply heavily (though don't explain since they do a terrible job at details like this) that this damage converts directly to Rifts, that means this character can splat anything in the game that is not literally invulnerable per action. Then just make them a Mega-Hero and make sure they have the Major Power Supernatural Strength and Tremendous P.S. as a Mega-Power. Almost nothing in the game can resist you. Worse comes to worst, grab a stake, some silver, a holy weapon, and a few other things you can use to make sure you kill invulnerable, intangible, etc. foes. Done.
B) Zebuloid Cyber-Knight. Even without the combos people mentioned of Battle Fury Blades, Magical-Adrenal Rush, etc., you can still dump out THOUSANDS of MDC a round. At level two. With NOTHING but the RCC and OCC. Let alone adding Amaki psi-sword amplifiers or Caliber-X, etc. etc.
C) Anything with Spin at High Velocity. That move just makes everything better.
D) Atlantean Stone Master. x1000 PS for picking up rocks. Now add on Gravity Manipulation, Weight Manipulation, supernatural P.S. buffs from spells and scrolls, Stone Ox training from Japan, and eventually you can splat Apsu with a rock.
In general:
ALWAYS take Ninjas and Superspies martial arts if your class is eligible for it. Screw O.C.C. Related skills.
ALWAYS take mutant powers if you can with your O.C.C. Screw O.C.C. Related skills.
Etc.
Wrong, wrong, wrong.
In one campaign, Goblins-themed, I rolled a Krynn Minotaur Monk. A 0 LA level 1 monk was thrashing third-to-fifth level enemies with class levels.
Anyone who rolls a Wizard, Druid or Cleric and isn't doing everything the Fighter or Barbarian can do but far, FAR better by fifth level is holding back or doesn't know how to play their class. Druids alone have class features better than entire classes.
In Rifts, lucky rolls for attributes rarely make you substantially stronger than everyone else, except for P.P. You have to get above 16 to see real benefits. In D&D, if I roll (as if I often do) a character with an 18, 18, 16, 16, 14, 12, I will make the person with an elite array a joke.
Some of the optimized combos are complex and hard to understand. Warhulk and Hulking Hurler is brain-smashingly obvious. The Vermin Lord H.I.V.E. trick is also pretty obvious. If you do the Vermin Lord trick, you can splat gods with your spells. Tome of Nine Swords combinations are so myriad and obvious it's tragic to even have to mention it. Not to mention the awful wording of Iron Heart Surge. And remember, while the differences may not be orders of magnitude, in Rifts anyone can pick up an absurdly broken energy weapon or railgun and do 2D6x10 M.D. and at least compete with the Cosmo-Knight's damage per round. But in D&D, the Barbarian and Fighter are likely to be literally useless.
Planar Shepherds have TWO, count them TWO, broken mechanics that are mind-blowingly obvious. First: Turn into extraplanars. Turn into a djinn, get Wishes, profit. Second: Manifest a bubble of the plane you're native to. Get 10 turns to their one. Profit.
Almost any PrC makes you better than almost any level of a base class, save Wizard, Druid, and Cleric.
And Rifts does not have a Pun-Pun.
I agree that, in general, Rifts is more broken. In particular, with Rifts different class choices give you different ranges of optimization, and a lot of classes are set at one level (e.g. a Dead Boy can't be optimized very much beyond sucking, and a Cosmo-Knight can't be optimized very much above or below being obscene). In other words, in D&D, the Wizard or the Druid can avoid casting the cheapest spells, specializing in the cheapest schools, and using the most broken wildshapes, but there's very little a player can do if they want to play a Cosmo-Knight but want to tone them down.
But I think you have to take Rifts more as a suite with options. You can organize it into tiers. A Cosmo-Knight, a Spirit Warrior, a Lizard Mage Mystic Knight, a Warlock (oh GOD Warlocks), a Xiticix Super-Warrior, and a converted Heroes Unlimited character can have a great time smashing face. Or you can roll a pure Coalition/Triax campaign and watch as your players have to run from the aforementioned team in mortal terror.
That having been said, IMHO, Phase World is actually fairly balanced. Heavy hitters like the Quatoria, Cosmo-Knight, Space Minotaur, etc. can co-exist pretty peacefully. C.J Carella was twinky as hell, but I will say this for most of his books: Aside from the standard skill monkey OCCs you have to throw into every Rifts book, most options within them are totally balanced.
A) Superliminal Flight + Rocket Charge or Rocket Fists (the first two are from Powers Unlimited 3, the latter from PU 2). Get going at Superliminal. Unlike Cosmo-Knight flight, this is NOT a hyperspatial jump, but your character going CONTINUOUSLY at that speed for the whole arc. Rocket Charge and Rocket Fists make it so you ignore ramming damage. Page 72 of HU Revised 2nd Edition gives you +4 damage per mile per hour. So:
186,000 miles per second per level [since you get x1 FTL per level] * 60 seconds per minute * 60 minutes per hour * 4 damage = Your base striking damage + 2,678,400,000
Since they imply heavily (though don't explain since they do a terrible job at details like this) that this damage converts directly to Rifts, that means this character can splat anything in the game that is not literally invulnerable per action. Then just make them a Mega-Hero and make sure they have the Major Power Supernatural Strength and Tremendous P.S. as a Mega-Power. Almost nothing in the game can resist you. Worse comes to worst, grab a stake, some silver, a holy weapon, and a few other things you can use to make sure you kill invulnerable, intangible, etc. foes. Done.
B) Zebuloid Cyber-Knight. Even without the combos people mentioned of Battle Fury Blades, Magical-Adrenal Rush, etc., you can still dump out THOUSANDS of MDC a round. At level two. With NOTHING but the RCC and OCC. Let alone adding Amaki psi-sword amplifiers or Caliber-X, etc. etc.
C) Anything with Spin at High Velocity. That move just makes everything better.
D) Atlantean Stone Master. x1000 PS for picking up rocks. Now add on Gravity Manipulation, Weight Manipulation, supernatural P.S. buffs from spells and scrolls, Stone Ox training from Japan, and eventually you can splat Apsu with a rock.
In general:
ALWAYS take Ninjas and Superspies martial arts if your class is eligible for it. Screw O.C.C. Related skills.
ALWAYS take mutant powers if you can with your O.C.C. Screw O.C.C. Related skills.
Etc.
Wrong, wrong, wrong.
In one campaign, Goblins-themed, I rolled a Krynn Minotaur Monk. A 0 LA level 1 monk was thrashing third-to-fifth level enemies with class levels.
Anyone who rolls a Wizard, Druid or Cleric and isn't doing everything the Fighter or Barbarian can do but far, FAR better by fifth level is holding back or doesn't know how to play their class. Druids alone have class features better than entire classes.
In Rifts, lucky rolls for attributes rarely make you substantially stronger than everyone else, except for P.P. You have to get above 16 to see real benefits. In D&D, if I roll (as if I often do) a character with an 18, 18, 16, 16, 14, 12, I will make the person with an elite array a joke.
Some of the optimized combos are complex and hard to understand. Warhulk and Hulking Hurler is brain-smashingly obvious. The Vermin Lord H.I.V.E. trick is also pretty obvious. If you do the Vermin Lord trick, you can splat gods with your spells. Tome of Nine Swords combinations are so myriad and obvious it's tragic to even have to mention it. Not to mention the awful wording of Iron Heart Surge. And remember, while the differences may not be orders of magnitude, in Rifts anyone can pick up an absurdly broken energy weapon or railgun and do 2D6x10 M.D. and at least compete with the Cosmo-Knight's damage per round. But in D&D, the Barbarian and Fighter are likely to be literally useless.
Planar Shepherds have TWO, count them TWO, broken mechanics that are mind-blowingly obvious. First: Turn into extraplanars. Turn into a djinn, get Wishes, profit. Second: Manifest a bubble of the plane you're native to. Get 10 turns to their one. Profit.
Almost any PrC makes you better than almost any level of a base class, save Wizard, Druid, and Cleric.
And Rifts does not have a Pun-Pun.
I agree that, in general, Rifts is more broken. In particular, with Rifts different class choices give you different ranges of optimization, and a lot of classes are set at one level (e.g. a Dead Boy can't be optimized very much beyond sucking, and a Cosmo-Knight can't be optimized very much above or below being obscene). In other words, in D&D, the Wizard or the Druid can avoid casting the cheapest spells, specializing in the cheapest schools, and using the most broken wildshapes, but there's very little a player can do if they want to play a Cosmo-Knight but want to tone them down.
But I think you have to take Rifts more as a suite with options. You can organize it into tiers. A Cosmo-Knight, a Spirit Warrior, a Lizard Mage Mystic Knight, a Warlock (oh GOD Warlocks), a Xiticix Super-Warrior, and a converted Heroes Unlimited character can have a great time smashing face. Or you can roll a pure Coalition/Triax campaign and watch as your players have to run from the aforementioned team in mortal terror.
That having been said, IMHO, Phase World is actually fairly balanced. Heavy hitters like the Quatoria, Cosmo-Knight, Space Minotaur, etc. can co-exist pretty peacefully. C.J Carella was twinky as hell, but I will say this for most of his books: Aside from the standard skill monkey OCCs you have to throw into every Rifts book, most options within them are totally balanced.
Last edited:
a4 shadow fox
First Post
I had a Ulquiarra rip off character once! He was a Space Pirate but what made him different was he ended up with a martial art. Sankukai
Zombie Flesh and Alter Physical Form Bone!
Turn the Bone into Magma and Instead of Space Pirate make it a Cosmo knight and you have the most powerful character EVER!
Zombie Flesh and Alter Physical Form Bone!
Turn the Bone into Magma and Instead of Space Pirate make it a Cosmo knight and you have the most powerful character EVER!
Lost Knowledge
First Post
In defense of vagabonds. The whole give up skills to get more superpowers plus vagabonds bonus power (conversation book) can make that class not only playable but very powerful. (Ex PE, Growth, Create Force Fields. And still chose several more powers gets thousands of MDC and at least 1d6x10 damage with a punch....)
HardcoreDandDGirl
First Post
I can't say anything was 'most' powerful, we did have a game back about 10 years ago that was way over board...
Matt was playing a dragon that shape shifted into a 8 year old girl and was pretending to be my daughter
I was an Alatian Undead slayer
Chris was a run away from the collation glitter boy pilot who we retro fit his armor with a spider walker cannon that crawled on his back, and he had a remote control speeder bike that we used to call in 'artillery fire' of mini missles
John was a Cosmo knight
and Betty was a technomage 'crazy' who had a cyclone armor brought over from robotech and a lightsaber designed for use in it's armored from...
The Cosmo Knight was by far the most powerful of us, but we all kicked but...
Edit: although my must fun game of rifts I was a Cyber Knight, and I ended up on good old Captian Nemo's ship finding out about his pre rifts tech...
Matt was playing a dragon that shape shifted into a 8 year old girl and was pretending to be my daughter
I was an Alatian Undead slayer
Chris was a run away from the collation glitter boy pilot who we retro fit his armor with a spider walker cannon that crawled on his back, and he had a remote control speeder bike that we used to call in 'artillery fire' of mini missles
John was a Cosmo knight
and Betty was a technomage 'crazy' who had a cyclone armor brought over from robotech and a lightsaber designed for use in it's armored from...
The Cosmo Knight was by far the most powerful of us, but we all kicked but...
Edit: although my must fun game of rifts I was a Cyber Knight, and I ended up on good old Captian Nemo's ship finding out about his pre rifts tech...
Last edited:
Lost Knowledge
First Post
Half (or more) of the combos listed here are blatantly against the rules of the system, yes it can be unbalanced, but many of the most powerful abblitys had limits on who could use it. Like no cybernetics with bio-regen, that included crazie and juicer upgrades. And superpowers are limited to the weakest classes and races. That said there are still many verry powerful combos.
Similar Threads
